From: Damien Broderick (thespike@earthlink.net)
Date: Fri Dec 13 2002 - 11:50:26 MST
Eli sez:
> I also didn't realize that your book to which you referred was available
> online. I
> http://www.ssec.wisc.edu/~billh/gotterdammerung.html
It surely has some attractive passages. Leaving aside technical disputes for
a moment, this seems to me to be the kind of point informed people should be
making as often as possible to the public at large:
< Some people fear that their lives will lose meaning without work. But the
kind of work we do in industrial societies is a relatively recent invention.
Primitive humans were very poor by our standards, but they generally didn't
spend long hours in unpleasant working conditions away from their families.
Their lives took meaning from personal relationships, and from their stories
and other forms of expression. When super-intelligent machines do all the
work, we will revert to this way of taking meaning from life, enhanced by
the wealth and companionship provided by the machines. >
and this rapturous envoi:
< People adore their gods, and express it in the beautiful hymns they sing,
in the beautiful cathedrals they build, and in the good they do in the name
of their gods. People will adore you. As a god they can meet face to face,
they will probably find new ways to express their adoration of you.
< I want to hear your music, participate in your theater, laugh at your
jokes, eat your cooking, learn about your mathematical and scientific
discoveries, and just spend time talking with you. I love nature and spend
time every day walking and bicycling, enjoying plants and animals. Nature is
beautiful. Humans and their creations are part of nature and its beauty. You
will be the most beautiful creation on earth. >
Dangerous, perhaps, because of the risks of fatwa and other religious
denunciation, but probably worth the risk.
Damien Broderick
www.thespike.us
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